on my mind

Phew I have so many little insignificant things to tell you that I don’t know where to start. The trouble with gorgeous weather of any kind is that it calls me outside and offline. And now that I’m online, I can’t think of how to get through all the past post ideas in my brain and proceed to the present.

I blushed and grinned and felt all warm and happy in my heart. Her kind words were even greater than the award, especially since I am a big fan of her blog.

The best part of this award is that I get to pass it on. This is tough as I read a lot of great blogs. This one has to go to Mental Terresse, one of my favorite haunts. Her posts are like gems, rare and beautiful. Each facet is carefully crafted. When I see her in my Google Reader, I wait until I know that I won’t be interrupted so that I can savor her writing. I especially admire how she intertwines lessons from her life with beautiful works of art. And I would be completely remiss if I didn’t point all of you to this post. It’s one of my absolute favorites.

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I’ve come back to this century! I have a cell phone and not just any cell phone, a wi-fi phone, which I think puts me smack dab in the middle of now.

The best part is that Shanel is talking to me again. It was a little touch and go there for awhile, but we are once again connected at the ear.

And after jiggling about some crumbling, antiquated wires in our basement, HungryMan fixed our landline too. However, he then decided that landlines are so last century, hence the paper wires, and that we didn’t really need three phones.

We said goodbye to Qwest and hello to wi-fi. And if you don’t count speaker wire, which I do, we have fully merged into the wireless generation. So don’t trying calling my home number, cause that number is now homeless.

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Oh, so your menu planning tips were so helpful. Primarily for kicking me in the pants.

You will be happy to know or at least I think you will be, that thanks to all of you and your marvelous ideas I have meals planned and purchased through the middle of next week.

I especially like the idea of saving menu’s for future months and making many meals on the weekend and eating them throughout the week.

One of the best tips that I got was from my friend, Tiffany. She has made her own cookbook with binder and plastic sheet protectors. Instead of saving too many magazines with good recipes in them, she tears the recipes out and puts them in the binder. Brilliant. And instead of stashing online recipe print-outs who knows where, she puts those in the binder too. Again, brilliant.

So I went right home and tore up my beloved issues of Real Simple and Cottage Living. And I sorted through my stash of online print-outs. I now have a binder full of our family’s favorites. I couldn’t bring myself to tear up my Everyday Food collection. I was a pioneer member back in 2003 and have a whole color coordinated set. I have organized them by month, because I too love to make what’s in season. I have been indexing my favorite recipes to make finding them easier.

This post is just riveting, I know.

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And while I’m at, I let you know that I’ve gone into organizing overdrive. This, in addition to my keen attention to the outdoor weather, has kept me far away from the keyboard.

The amount of upheaval in our home has caused Ava to suspect that leprechauns have reappeared. Of course the two-inch men are now being blamed for mischief caused by a forty-two-inch sprite. I’ve set out traps. It remains to be seen who will get caught, but I’m going to put money on the one with pigtails.

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Early this summer, HungryMan rolled out some new grass on the base of our front lawn. It was green and lush and wonderful until the clouds rolled away. We had weeks of scorching sunshine. Which is great, if you love to go to the beach. But it’s not so great if you trying to transform your lawn from an eyesore to a lush meadow.

Where we once had grass, we now have shredded wheat.

Bring your shears and bit of brown sugar and you will nearly have the breakfast of champions.

On Saturday, HungryMan rolled up the scorched sod and sowed grass seed, while Ava performed search and rescue on the worm community. After establishing a relocation shelter for the displaced worm families, she gave me a tour of the facilities and introduced me to some of the residents.

“Mama, look. This is the daddy worm. He’s the biggest!”

“Worms are good for the earth, Mama. Did you know that? Did you know that? They’re good for the earth. It’s really true.”

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Last week, Ava and I drove with our friends to see Sarah Palin and John McCain at a rally north of here. We the mamas thought it would a great opportunity for the girls to get a glimpse of the political process in our country and for them to see a potential president. As it turned out nearly every other person in the Twin Cities had the same Friday morning agenda.

Surprisingly from our stellar vantage point, we neither saw nor heard McCain or Palin. I was told by a very tall man with stilts for legs that the candidates were somewhere under the “N” in Palin. Ten point if you can find them.

Ava and her friend’s educational experience was reduced to a greater than/less than lesson conducted with diminishing pieces of a Cliff Bar.

While we weren’t able to hear the candidates’ speeches, we did get quite an earful from protesters.

Taking the above photograph proved to be the tactical error of the morning.

“Look! There goes a WAL-MART FAMILY,” a man yelled at me as soon as I snapped the photo. Others joined his taunt sending Ava and I marching to the beat of “Wal-Mart family! Wal-Mart family! Wal-Mart family!” Just as we were turning away from them, another one hollered, “Hey! Where’d ya get that backpack Wal-Mart family?!?”

Evidently they weren’t too familiar with my blog. Or maybe they were and knew that was an insult that would stick.

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Last Wednesday morning, Ava and I were about to leave for preschool when she turned and dashed back to her room.

“Oh Mama, I forgot. I’m supposed to wear three necklaces today,” she said as I walked in on her throwing everything out of her accessory drawer.

“Why are you supposed to wear three necklaces?”

“Cause Sarah and I are going to wear three necklaces today.”

“Sarah and you are going to wear three necklaces today?”

“Yes, Mama. I already told you,” she said as she grabbed my hand to go out to the car.

On the way to preschool she gave me the long version of a short story. While riding home on the bus from the apple orchard, Ava and her friend had made a pact to wear three necklaces.

Of course, I wasn’t sure if this explanation was true or not as it came from the same child that had found a leprechaun in her bedroom that very morning. He was a very kind leprechaun, who liked to sit in Ava’s hand and tell her stories. She tried to put him in a jar, but somehow he ran away. “It’s really the truth. It wasn’t a dream at all!”

We walked into Ava’s classroom and Sarah came running up to us with three strands of beads bouncing about her neck.

Who knew coordinating outfits began at four?

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Well my mind feels relieved; I hope yours has survived this too long post. Apparently Ava’s not the only one that prefers the long version. But you already knew that, didn’t you?

Thanks Rachel. I’m honored. Really. Especially since my writing has been a bit splotchy lately. Hopefully it’s all for a good cause. The Lather, Rinse post that you liked is one of the ones I’m working on for my manuscript submission. I should probably just leave it alone, but I’m always trying to revise…

That photo of Ava with the worm is priceless. I love that she looks proud, not squeemish. I predict I’ll be voting for her for Pres. in a few more years.

I really miss my little visits at your house after school….when you would “catch me up” on all the latest news with you, Ava, and HungryMan. So, second best is reading your blog. Thank you for that! I can almost imagine sitting there with a cup of tea and listening to your chatter and just smiling.

I don’t get the “Wal-mart family” comment, either, and I am an American. Heck, I live near you!

After watching Planet Earth I learned that the most resilient living thing on the globe is grass. Apparently the Planet Earth folks never visited Minnesota.

Lastly, before this becomes a post in and of itself, I have found the binder method to work very well for me, too. Unfortunately, I haven’t weeded out the recipes that I’ve not made in ages, and I have a stack about a foot tall of recipes waiting to go in the binder…maybe a secondary binder is in order of “recipes I’d like to try”?

awesome! i love all those stories. thanks for the recap!
i’m glad there was a link to that other blog, too. i have always loved that painting of the mother and her daughter…i love how lovely and fresh it is.
so, thanks.

That was fun. I love random stories. I “do” the binder thing to. Only mine has been reduced to pages stuck in the front of the binder to be catalogued at a later date…not sure when that later date will be ….

More thoughts on the Wal-Mart family. I think that the WORST insult I got in seventh grade was when a popular girl made fun of me for wearing pants from Wal-Mart. And, I remember being SOO embarrassed when my mom would say at the mall, “We could get this so much cheaper at Wal-Mart.” Now, I shop there sometimes, but I do want to run away. The Target people have certainly targeted me! However, I would never rag on someone for shopping at Wal-Mart… Maybe those protesters need to come to the hood where I live and try pointing at some of my neighbors who likely shop at Wal-Mart because it’s what they can afford. I can guarantee that they would be eating their words soon.

I don’t understand the Wal-Mart family, chant either…I don’t get the chant and I don’t get why they would pick on a sweet little family walking by! As someone else said, I’m offended for you. Oh well. 🙂

This was a great post, by the way…not boring at all. And it almost inspired me to start sorting through and tearing away at my Real Simple magazine collection. ALMOST. 🙂

i don’t know why i hesitate to write “brain dump” posts. they are so cathartic for the blogger and so delicious for the reader. i feel caught up, rachel. and it feels good. i do want to go cold cock a democrat for calling you and tiff wal-mart families, but i’ll be alright…i’ll just grab a cool one and forget that they are probably my neighbors!